Knights strike for four third-period goals to even series with Erie

He wasn’t ready to face playoff elimination again. His London Knights did that enough in the opening round against Windsor.

So down once more in the third period to Erie, the big forward grabbed the puck, gritted his teeth, bulled his way to the net and willed it over the Otters goal line.

He gave the defending champs life and they rode his wave to a frenzied four-goal rally for a 4-2 Game 4 victory to tie this series before 9,036 Thursday at Budweiser Gardens.

"I’m a big guy so I’m hard to knock off, right," the Ducks first-rounder said. "I just took control when I had it and found my lanes. It’s four-on-four, so I just decided to beat my own guy one-on-one there.

"It was everything I could do — speed and power."

Erie is a good enough squad to handle a lot of what the Knights can throw at them.

But Jones is more than a handful.

You got the feeling if all the Otters on the ice — and even a few on the bench — climbed onto his back there during that one-man cycle show down low, he still would’ve made it to the slot and buried it.

That’s the kind of determination Erie is facing right now.

"He’s such a strong guy and good skater," London assistant coach Rick Steadman said. "When he puts his mind to going to the net, no one can stop him. We’ve been needing that of him. When you see a guy work that hard to make a play to basically put the team on his back and say, "Listen, I’m going to get a goal and don’t really care how it looks and how I get there’.

"When guys do that, you can just feel the energy on the bench."

And for good measure, he scored the empty netter. He has three of those in the post-season already.

He took the puck, and once he had it, nobody was getting it back until he scored again.

"That’s Jones-y for ya," Knights teammate Robert Thomas said. "He always does that. It’s sort of his style. That (first goal) was for sure the biggest play of the game. Once we got one, we knew the floodgates would open.

"It was a huge part of the series right there."

London scored four goals in the first 11 periods of this series. They just scored four more in that pivotal third.

They’ve had some sensational late-game victories this year — remember Owen Sound when Tyler Parsons was missing and a stunning comeback in Kitchener — but this was something else against the best team in the league.

"They (the Knights) didn’t have any luck in the first two periods," Erie coach Kris Knoblauch said, "and they got their luck in the third period scoring goals. Overall, sitting back on the lead, you don’t want that,. We’re good because we like to attack and have the puck all the time. We didn’t have the puck enough.

"We had to defend more than we like to."

They were knocked on their heels by Jones. Then, Janne Kuokkanen erupted for a pair of goals in 31 seconds.

It was a Finnish flash flood. He has a team-leading seven playoff tallies — one more than fellow Finn Olli Maatta managed in his amazing run with London to an OHL title in 2012.

"Whole crowd woke up after those two goals," the Hurricanes prospect said.

And the absolute best part?

Both were scored against Erie’s top trio of Dylan Strome, Alex DeBrincat and Taylor Raddysh.

The Otters Super Line showed signs of breaking out here the past two games.

That furious flurry staggered them a bit.

"Their big line is known for offence," Jones said. "They’re not good in the D zone there. Two goals in 31 seconds, that’s pretty lethal right there."

He’s bull-like, and blunt, too.

"Now, they (Erie) will be worried about us again," Steadman said.

The Otters still have so much going for them. They retain home-ice advantage, they have so much firepower and they’re winning the special teams battle.

But when a game is on the line again and Jones gets that look in his eye, will they be able to stop him?

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